Edburga (Old English Eadburh, 'rich fortress') was born around 920 to King Edward the Elder of Wessex and his third wife Queen Eadgifu — making her the granddaughter of Alfred the Great and the half-sister of King Æthelstan (924–939), the first king of all the English.
According to the hagiographical tradition, when she was three years old, the royal household conducted a symbolic test: royal jewels and a chalice with the Gospels were laid before the young princess, who chose the chalice and Gospels over the jewels — interpreted as the divine indication of her future monastic vocation.
She was given as a child oblate to the Nunnaminster (St. Mary's Abbey) in Winchester — the royal Wessex women's-abbey founded by her grandmother Queen Ealhswith (the wife of Alfred the Great). She spent her entire life from age three to her death at age forty as a simple Benedictine nun at the Nunnaminster, serving as royal embroideress, sacristan, and care-giver of the poor.
She died on June 15, 960. The reputation for sanctity was so immediate that her relics were translated in 972 by Bishop St. Æthelwold of Winchester (during the Benedictine reform period) to a new shrine — and again translated to Pershore Abbey in Worcestershire in the late 10th century (during the Benedictine monastic-reform expansion). The Pershore shrine of St. Edburga became the principal pilgrim destination of Worcestershire throughout the medieval centuries.